Pages

Saturday, March 8, 2014

How Much Are Your Students Engaged?

Hey everyone! I'm Amy from Cahill's Creations! As educators, we are constantly engaging our kids throughout the day. We do this by creating amazing material to teach the standards. We get kids talking about their learning and working collaboratively. We use interactive notebooks and anchor charts. We do what all great teachers do to engage student learning.

Even though I've been teaching for 10 years, I'm always looking for new ways to motivate and engage my little learners. I realize that their attention span can only take so much at a time, so I need to make every minute matter!

This year more than ever, I discovered the power of YouTube in my class. I can type whatever we're learning and a fun song pops up that engages my kids and gets them singing. Here are some great examples of what we've been working on in my higher level reading group:

I created a Bossy e pack that my kids absolutely love using! Find it here.

We do a song every day to start our lesson and the kids absolutely love it! Then, we go into the lesson and the kids are actually helping each other use reading strategies by singing the songs. Songs are so powerful in the early grades. They're engaging and motivating. Songs help kids remember, pay attention, and think!

"I remember from the song" is a very common response to my question, "How do you know?" I love hearing that because it's another way to cement their learning.

Youtube doesn't end at reading time. It is a big part of our learning day. I use it for transition time or when we're playing a sorting game where the kids have to get into groups based on whatever objects they have. Most recently, I played this song while kids moved around the room to find others who had the same 3D shapes. They had to be sitting in their groups by the time the song ended.

My class knows when it's math time when they hear this song: (It's very soothing, so I also love it!)

Here's one more we've been using as we were learning all about shapes.

Okay, so I am a little obsessed with using YouTube as a learning tool in my kindergarten classroom. I see so many benefits throughout the day. I sure hope you can access it too because it's amazing! Just type in whatever skill your class is working on and I'm sure something amazing will pop up! :) Have fun and get your students engaged! If you have any great resources that your kids absolutely love, please share!

I will not be using these engaging songs for awhile because we are officially on spring break! WooooHooo!

2
comments:

I love YouTube as a teaching tool as well. My grade 5 students love getting up and dancing to various songs for a brain break. When I find a good song I add it to my Pinterest brain break board so that they are easy to find.